Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu met Jana Sena leader Nadendla Manohar and Andhra Pradesh BJP president P.V.N. Madhav at his Undavalli residence on Monday to discuss seat-sharing and coordination among the National Democratic Alliance partners for the upcoming local body polls.
The meeting comes after the state government notified reservations for Scheduled Tribes, Scheduled Castes, Backward Classes and women for the posts of mayors in 17 municipal corporations and chairpersons in 106 municipalities and nagar panchayats. No official statement was released on the discussions, but sources cited in the report said reservation arrangements formed part of the talks.
The alliance partners are understood to have submitted lists of seats they want to contest, based on their respective organisational and electoral strengths. The leaders discussed those claims and the possibility of allotting seats to candidates regarded as having stronger prospects, according to the sources.
The discussions are taking place before the State Election Commission is expected to announce the local body poll schedule, possibly on October 14. The NDA partners are working to finalise candidates and coordinate their campaign strategy before the election process formally begins.
The seat-sharing exercise will determine how the ruling alliance distributes contests across municipal corporations, municipalities and nagar panchayats. These local institutions are responsible for important aspects of urban administration, including civic services and local development, making the reservation and candidate-selection process significant for representation at the city and town level.
The alliance is seeking to improve on its performance in the previous Assembly elections, when it won 164 of Andhra Pradesh’s 175 seats, recording a strike rate of about 93 per cent. The local body elections will test whether that electoral coordination can be translated into a common contest across urban and semi-urban local institutions.
Naidu had reportedly told a party election strategy meeting earlier that the alliance would allocate 40 per cent of seats to Backward Classes while safeguarding the interests of Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities. He had also called for closer coordination among the alliance partners to challenge the YSRC in the local body polls.
The next formal step is the State Election Commission’s announcement of the election schedule. Until then, the alliance partners are expected to continue discussions on seat allocation, candidate selection and campaign coordination.
